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The 6th edition of 40K introduces AP for melee weapons. Previously many melee weapons where listed as "Ignores Armor Saves". Now they have an supposed to have Armor Penetration value just like ranged weapons.

Eldrad's weapon's rules are listed as:

...a melee weapon that wounds on a 2+ regardless of toughness and ignores armor saves

Yreil's weapon's rules are listed as:

...as a Witchblade that ignores armor saves

Nowhere in the rules are they called out as being power weapons, which according to the new edition would cause them to be classified as Unusual Power Weapons and get AP3. They are also neither listed in the Master Rule Book appendix which is supposed to update all existing weapons for the new edition,

My inclination is to interpret them as written and say that no one can take armor saves against wounds caused by these weapons.

Is that the correct interpretation, or am I missing something in core rule book that would clarify the issue?

2 Answers
2

My understanding is that you are correct, though now that I've looked I can't find any reliable sources confirming it. Multiple forum conversations agreeing with you, yes, but nothing I'd call "reliable".

As you say, they were never categorised as "power weapons", so my position would be that unless a FAQ is released that explicitly says otherwise, these weapons should not allow armour saves.

(And since this page is the first result for most of the phrases I searched for, I suppose there should be an answer here, even if it's not 100% certain!)

You are correct in that neither weapon entitles a model wounded by them to a standard armour save. Invulnerable armour saves would be taken as normal.

The approach to determining this is if a weapon or a weapon's special rules are not covered in the Rule Book ("Big Yellow Book" or BYB, 6th edition) then you take the description as written in the Codex.

In the case of these two weapons:

Staff of Ulthamar

There is no mention that this is a weapon listed in the BRB, and so we use the description on p51 of the current Codex: Eldar:

"In combat it always wounds on a roll of 2+ and ignores armour saves."

The Spear of Twilight

The Codex mentions on page 53 that this is a Singing Spear and adds a further rule, ignoring armour saves, to that weapon description:

"It is a Singing Spear that ignores armour saves (see page 27)."

Referring to Page 27, the Singing Spear is a weapon that is similar to a Witchblade but note that it is not listed as a Witchblade. It has it's own weapon profile, rules and description listed in this Codex and these are not overridden by anything in the new rule book.

As a result we use the profile detailed on this page, remembering to add in the "ignores armour saves" rules mentioned in the Spear of Twilight's own description.